Media items such as movies, television shows, music, etc. may be digitally stored as media files in various file formats. Media devices that playback these media files may be limited to a set of file formats that are supported by the media device. For example, a media device may not support particular formats such as, for example, high definition, high frame rates, various compression formats, etc. To successfully play back media files in such devices, the media files may need to be transcoded. Transcoding is a process that relates to converting a file from one format into another format. Transcoding may involve completely decoding each picture or audio frame of a media file to a raw format, processing the raw format by performing any number of specified operations, and encoding the raw format to a target format. Media devices may have limited storage capacity, and it may be desirable to transcode media files into a format with a smaller file size. By performing transcoding on a media file, the media file may be converted from an unsupported file format to a supported file format, the media file may be converted from a larger file size to a smaller file size, or may otherwise undergo another type of conversion.